The search for kindness should be a central part of human existence. To
ancient Greek philosophers, what you did mattered far more than what you
knew.

One of the stories of this week has been the cruel behaviour and threats made by some on Twitter towards others. As the classicist Mary Beard, a victim of unpleasant online misogyny, says, if the web did not create the internet-troll mentality, it gave it planetary reach. It is probably the case that a form of narcissism has been provoked by technological isolation. And it is true that many city-dwellers seem disconnected, except to their smartphones. But it would be shallow to blame electronic devices for a lack of empathy. After all, for centuries people concentrated on books – traditional information-retrieval systems – to the temporary exclusion of social contact, and the results were good or bad, depending on the book, and on the reader.

A bigger question is at issue, one so big that it is perhaps not often enough addressed explicitly. It is kindness – or a kind of kindness. It is not the sort of kindness that makes us stroke kittens. It is the sort that starts by making life in a polity more polite. Politics, too, is (or should be) personal behaviour writ large. A well-behaved polity relies on the decisions of individuals, not on the commands of the state.

People often feel in present-day life as though they haven’t time to think about personal conduct. We are jostled by events, steamrollered by the pace of life. In reality, we might slump in front of the television as the night hours wear away, but we are left with the impression that the busy hours of the day are a succession of practical actions, in which we are certainly right, and other people (when they are annoying and get in the way, as they so often do, as if deliberately) are stupid and wrong.

Kindness was the subject chosen by the American fiction writer George Saunders for an address at this year’s graduation day for students of Syracuse University in New York state. Such a speech is almost impossible to make without sounding pompous, dull or glib, but the author did so. It is available on the internet and is worth seeking out. “What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness,” said Mr Saunders. He singled out not having been kinder at school to a girl who was picked on by others. He believes that such kindness is, more than anything, the best thing we can give to each other. And he identifies three illusions harboured by many which he described as enemies of kindness: that they are the centre of the universe, that they are quite separate from the rest of the world, and that they are immortal.

It is not always fashionable in today’s fast world to contemplate death. But doing so gives perspective to what Mr Saunders calls the “sickness” of selfishness. He proposes a lifelong commitment to finding remedies, such as education, immersion in a work of art, meditation and prayer, a frank talk with a good friend and establishment in some spiritual tradition.

The search for kindness should be a central part of human existence. To ancient Greek philosophers, what you did mattered far more than what you knew. That is even more obvious in the Judaeo-Christian tradition. If a life of liberty is one that enables you to pursue happiness, as the founders of the United States declared, it had long before been discovered that, to hit the target of happiness, it was better not to aim directly at it. Happiness is not the same as gratification, and cannot be secured in isolation from everyone else. It is in fact a by-product of forming connections with people, of making a sacrifice on behalf of another. A line in the Saunders peroration on reducing selfishness comes in here: “If you have kids, that will be a huge moment in your process of self-diminishment.” Having children almost automatically makes us put some other human beings first. If this goes badly wrong it is the bitterest crime, as we also saw this week. Bringing up children is a vote of confidence for the future. Hope for the future depends on how those children behave. And their behaviour depends on what kindness they find in the rest of us.

The modern world asks a great deal of the individual. It can be a driven, confrontational place. All the more reason, then, to remember what truly matters. As Mr Saunders says: “As a goal in life, you could do worse than: try to be kinder.”